The invention relates to a solid textile care composition and the use and production thereof. In addition, the invention relates to a detergent or cleaning agent containing the solid textile care composition.
Due to repeated washing, textiles often become hard and lose their softness. To restore their softness/flexibility to textiles, to impart a pleasant scent to them and/or to improve their antistatic properties, after the actual laundering and cleaning process, the textiles are treated with a fabric softener in a subsequent rinsing operation.
Most fabric softeners on the market are aqueous formulations contain as the main active ingredient a cationic textile-softening compound having one or two long-chain alkyl groups in one molecule. Widely used cationic textile-softening compounds comprise, for example, methyl-N-(2-hydroxyethyl)-N,N-di(tallow acyloxyethyl)ammonium compounds, methyl-N-(2-hydroxyethyl)-N,N-di(tallow acyloxyethyl)ammonium compounds or N,N-dimethyl-N,N-di(tallow acyloxyethyl)ammonium compounds.
Because of the cationic textile-softening compounds, these traditional fabric softener formulations cannot be used simultaneously with the detergent or cleaning agent in the actual detergent or cleaning operating, since the cationic textile-softening compounds enter into unwanted interactions with the anionic surfactants of the detergents or cleaning agents. Therefore, an additional rinsing operation is required, but this is time consuming and energy intensive.
Another disadvantage is that traditional fabric softeners do not prevent the deposition of lime residues on the laundry during the rinsing operation. Furthermore, the traditional water softeners often leave an unattractive deposit in the rinse dispenser compartment of the washing machine.
Problems may also occur with other textile care compounds, necessitating separate dosing and/or a separate rinse cycle, for example.